The Restoration of Otto Laird by Nigel Packer
Written by Victoria After a long and busy life at the forefront of modern architecture, Otto Laird at 78 is more than happy to live peacefully in Switzerland with his…
Tell No Tales by Eva Dolan
Written by Victoria One of the things fiction does best is bring to life otherwise abstract debates on political or philosophical matters. There’s nothing like a story for showing us…
An Interview with Sophia Tobin, Author of The Widow’s Confession
Questions from Victoria 1. I found the two American cousins in The Widow’s Confession very evocative and enigmatic characters – what was your inspiration for their part of the story? It was…
The Widow’s Confession by Sophia Tobin
Written by Victoria Best Broadstairs, Kent in the early summer of 1951, and visitors are arriving to spend extended holidays on its beaches. Edmund Steele, a middle-aged medical man has…
Adèle Geras – A Life in Books
Interview by Victoria Adèle Geras and I had an unexpected chance to bond before we ever met. We were both on our way to a café in a south Cambridgeshire village,…
Forever Yours by Daniel Glattauer
Translated from the German by Jamie Bulloch Reviewed by Victoria Best Well this is a curious book, and one that’s been divisive in the online reviews, with a fair few…
Lucky Us by Amy Bloom
Reviewed by Victoria Best ‘My father’s wife died. My mother said we should drive down to his place and see what might be in it for us.’ So begins this…
Goldeneye – Where Bond ws Born: Ian Fleming’s Jamaica by Matthew Parker
Reviewed by Victoria Best One of the reasons Ian Fleming wrote such good plots was because his time in Naval Intelligence during the Second World War meant that he lived…
Dear Thief by Samantha Harvey
Reviewed by Victoria Best I wonder if not being able to see ourselves is one of the great paradoxes of being alive – knowing oneself intimately and also not at…
Forty-One False Starts by Janet Malcom
Review by Victoria Best I’ve been a huge fan of Janet Malcolm since reading her brilliant biography of Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes, The Silent Woman. What she could do –…
Spotlight on Publishing: Buried River Press
1. Can you tell us a little bit about how the imprint was started? We launched Buried River Press in spring of this year, and have published seven titles to…
Help for the Haunted by John Searles
Reviewed by Victoria Best. Lying in bed, 14-year-old Sylvie Mason hears a telephone call summoning her parents out into the middle of a snowy Baltimore night. This isn’t unusual; her…
Flying Shoes by Lisa Howorth
Reviewed by Victoria Best What do they do to writers down in Mississippi? Is there a school, I wonder, where prospective writers go in order to be marinaded in a bath of…
Problems with People by David Guterson
Reviewed by Victoria Best. Ever since Snow Falling on Cedars came out, I’ve had David Guterson marked as an author I was curious to try. Great to know, then, that it’s only…
Little Lies by Liane Moriarty
(aka Big Little Lies) Reviewed by Victoria Best There’s a ruckus going down at Pirriwee Public Kindergarten where there ought to be an ordinary fund-raising trivia night. Elderly Mrs Ponder…
Shiny New Author: Questions for Angus Watson
In the first of a new series in which we interview debut authors, Victoria talked to Angus Watson, author of Age of Iron. V: When did you first realise you wanted…
An Interview with Tom Barbash
Tell us about your apprenticeship in art – what experiences have made you the writer you are today? My first real job after college was as a reporter in a…
Monique Roffey – A Profile
By Victoria Best Monique Roffey has been on a creative roll for the best part of a decade and has seen her work rise to prominence and gain critical acclaim;…
Iza’s Ballad by Magda Szabó
Translated by George Szirtes Reviewed by Victoria Best I often shy away from books in translation, afraid they will sound clunky and odd. But this 1963 novel by renowned Hungarian…
Q&A with Mira Jacob
Questions by Victoria 1. Can you recall the first time you knew you wanted to be a writer? In second grade, we made our own blank-paged, cloth bound books. I…
The Sleepwalker’s Guide to Dancing by Mira Jacob
Reviewed by Victoria Best How much are we responsible for the things that happen to the people we love? This is one of the underpinning themes of Mira Jacob’s sprawling,…
In Love and War by Alex Preston
By Victoria Best It is 1937 and disgraced Cambridge student, Esmond Lowndes – caught in bed with another boy by the Master of Emmanuel College, no less – is being…
Reading Scotland
Selected by Victoria Best You’d think everything there is to say about Scotland has been said in the media over the past couple of months. But there’s been a suspicious…
The Grand Duchess of Nowhere by Laurie Graham
Reviewed by Victoria Best Laurie Graham is one of those authors who never seem to get the attention and acknowledgement they deserve. Her novels are engrossing and clever and so,…